Down on the farm!

Before we left Jackson Monday morning Kody, myself, Grandma, and Teresa went to lunch at Jones Heritage Farms. Kody had heard about this place where they raise their own beef, pork, chicken, eggs, and vegetables and sell them on the farm. It's located in Cape Girardeau, but really in between Jackson and Cape in the country. We pulled up and I was so surprised to see all the animals running around, it was really neat!

We went inside and ordered lunch. We all had BBQ pork sandwiches and I had their potato salad...hello heaven! It was really good. Their BBQ was great too. In SE Missouri they slice their pork, rather than pull or shred it, but it is just as good, Kody will say better! ;) You can buy their products there like the meat, eggs, fresh milk, cheese, etc. You can also buy different kinds of jellys, jams, salsa, chips, etc. I figured we'd come home with a car load full of stuff, but Kody held back.

After lunch we drove through the farm. The farm is nestled on some really nice land. I always say when we are exploring SE Missouri, it's really God's country. Beautiful land there, not the rocky stuff we have here! We saw baby sheep, big pigs, little pigs, tiny piglets, cows, chickens, you name it--we saw it! The baby piggies were my favorite!!

Here's a Momma pig with some of her babies!

There were 16 of these babies!

Made us want to take one home! :) If you are near the Cape Girardeau/Jackson area go by there, neat place!

Sunday!

Back to our weekend...

I met Lisa, a lady I used to work with at RPDC for an early lunch at Qdoba Sunday morning. I hadn't seen Lisa since October 2008...and I have missed this lady so much! She was like the Mom of myself, Jess, and Melissa--another student worker. We had so much fun with Lisa at work, probably more so than we needed to! One of my favorite memories was Cinco de Mayo and we all went to lunch at El Acapulco...and we all had drinks. HAHA then we had to go back to work. Ok, we just had like 1 drink each, but I was worthless the rest of the afternoon. And NO I would never do that now, it was in college and a college job. So please do not judge! Lisa and I talked for 2 hours and caught each other up on our lives. She has 2 daughters a little younger than me, Destiny & Jackie, so I got caught up on what they are up to! We laughed a lot and it was a lot of fun! Miss you Lisa!

After lunch with Lisa I ran to Target and quickly got back to Jackson. I played with Drew for the remainder of the afternoon. I was worn out! Here are some of our play pictures after his nap while his Mom got ready...

Here he is sticking his tongue out at their lab, Maggie

He crawled and sat in front of Maggie and posed. He knows Aunt Mal is a camera freak and he was ready to pose...

Probably my favorite during his pose session....

Drew takes after his Dad & MeMaw...loves to clean! haha!

Yucky picture of Me and I love his mouth full of cheese-its!

When we were done playing we met everyone over at John & Teresa's for dinner/John's bday dinner. It was a full house (usually is!)...Erica, Kyle, Drew, Mallory, Kody, John, Teresa, Uncle Desi, Aunt Barb, Grandma, and her neighbor Marion...plus 3 dogs. And we were missing Kaci, Luke, and Oscar, another dog! We had a yummy dinner....lots to pick from! Teresa had bought some type of smoked meat and it was heaven. SO good...they grilled hot dogs, had crock pot corn, deviled eggs, salad, potato casserole, beer bread, baked beans, cole slaw, pineapple upside down cake, angel food cake & strawberries! We definitely miss Sunday dinners!

Drew loves Uncle Ko-Ko as he was calling him and loves his hat....so here he is with his hat and a cooler playing Uncle Redneck....haha. When I pull out the camera he says CHEESEEEEEEEEEEE and then says see? see? Because I let him look at the picture when he's done.My favorite...Getting ready to "sit" in his little chair...he doesn't sit long!Looks like Aunt Mal is ticking him off with the camera...ENOUGH he says.Showing MeMaw how to work his toy!Cleaning again! I don't know how his little legs do not fall off....
It was PaPa's birthday and he got a chain saw and some stuff to go with it. I love this picture because along with Kody & John, Drew is into the gift as well...
Here they are with Uncle Desi, who also just had a birthday...Drew's into it again, he is loving these man toys! Looks like his little mouth is saying, "OHHHHH"Drew finally gets a "toy" some kind of sharpening stick...it was not sharp. He thinks he has something "big!"I gave him a very quick bath while everyone was downstairs and then we played some more...We spiked his hair up and he was petting Bo...you can't really see either one of them. After we finished at dinner we went over to Lindsey & Adrian's house. They are Kyle & Erica's neighbors and family friends of the Thompsons. They have a sweet little girl, Ashlyn who is 2 months older than Drew...she'll be 2 in May. Drew & Ashy as he calls her are quite a pair. Here they are with their dog, Jesse--who I LOVE, and Drew is giving Ashlyn love. Too cute!I think Drew plays with Ashlyn's girl toys quite a bit! ;) I think it is evident for the grandparents and relatives that live away when we have a baby you probably won't have to go a day without seeing some picture of them. I went crazy taking them of Drew and it's obvious in this post! We can't wait to see the little guy again (& everyone else!), hopefully soon!

Surprise! You're 60, Uncle Joe!

When Kody and I got to Jackson Saturday night we headed over to his Aunt Susan & Uncle Dwain's house to celebrate a 60th birthday party for his Uncle Joe Thompson. It was a surprise but we missed that. Aunt Robin (Joe's wife), BJ (his son), and Aunt Susan (his sister) planned it. It was a lot of fun, just like any other Thompson party! There were around 90-100 people there and several I did not know. Many were classmates I was told, so I'm figuring that's why many faces were strangers. Dinner was awesome, smoke pork steaks, chicken, baked beans, dips, potato salad, chips, CAKE, brownies, COOKIES, cookie cake, etc. Lots of beer too! :)

Getting to the party, being surprised by BJ first and the garage door is open!
Brother, John comes out of the garage to greet and show Baby Drew off (our nephew!) The Thompsons know how to party and EAT! Jimmy Walker & Drew having a moment! No, there weren't 60 candles...we would have been there all night! ;) These "60" brownies must just have 60 calories in them?!!!! Quite a crowd...Quite a night! I was 100% exhausted by the time we arrived home shortly after 1 am. I had been up since before 6, remember?! So fun though!

Baby Shower(s)!

I had a fun-filled weekend! I was off work Friday and cleaned house, prepared food for Casey's shower, and grocery shopped. My mom came out when she got off work and we hung pictures in our bedroom. My bedroom is complete but the window treatments and we are working on that! Friday evening Kody and I went out with my parents for awhile to their farm to look/see the new baby calves. They were so cute, I wanted to take them all home. :) We had a quick dinner with them and headed home to finish getting ready for the shower.

Saturday began EARLY. We were out of the house by 6 am and I joined Kody for breakfast at Ozark Cafe. It was so good as usual. On Saturdays Kody eats there with a couple of co-workers, I went along so I could drop him off at work that way in the afternoon all I had to do was pick him up and we could leave town. After breakfast I headed back to the house, cleaned the floors, painted my toes, and rested for a bit before I had to go get ready and pick up Mom for the first baby shower. I got to her house about 10:15 and we went to a shower for twin boys that were born already. They were adorable, soooo sweet! Just slept most of the time. Their big sister, who is 3, has blossomed from a little shy girl to a pretty outgoing 3 year old! It was a really nice shower with yummy brunch food, but we could only stay for awhile since I had my shower to prepare for!

I got home around 12 and the girls started coming to help set up. I made ham, cheese, & poppyseed sandwiches, veggies & dip, and a corn salsa. Ashley made spinach dip and her mom's GOOD punch, Courtney Judd made a diaper cake and Jessica made cupcakes! There was quite a spread!

Hard to see but I made Baby Garrett a banner! Kody was kind enough to hang it for me! :) Me, Casey--Mom-to-be, and Courtney RisnerWith Courtney Risner's baby, Rorie. What a sweetie! She was obsessed with sticking her tongue out! It was a pretty quick shower. Casey was done opening gifts around 2 and she got a lot of great things, useful things too! Her due date is April 18th but he could be making an arrival any time between now and then! We cleaned up and most people left. Ashley, Courtney Judd, and Lindsey stayed after and we chatted for awhile. Then it was time to get Kody and hit the road!

We were out of town by 4 and in Jackson by 7. The boys got to ride in the Yukon for the first time. We took the 3rd row seat out and put down an old comforter & sheets. We turned the rear air on full blast for them and they were OUT COLD (literally) for the 3 hour drive. They never got up to move around because they had a TON of room, much more than riding in the truck. Here's a peak at Bo riding good!